Twins Talk: Signing of Hughes looks good again in duel against Verlander

You could call Minnesota’s 2-1 win over the Tigers a pitchers’ duel but the truth is that Phil Hughes had to get out a much tougher lineup than Justin Verlander.

The Twins had Chris Parmelee playing right field and Eduardo Nunez at DH. Parmelee might still prove to be a guy who can hit major-league hitting but he’s offered scant proof of that.

Nunez – am I supposed to know something about this guy? – has 10 home runs in 755 at-bats. Nobody writes Nunez in as the DH unless the other options are spectacularly worse.

So you especially try to lean on your starter and those who follow in this case. Hughes was the guy to pull that off against one of the best starters in baseball on a night when he was, predictably, plowing through a light-hitting Twins lineup.

Hughes is a guy to root for, whether you’re attached to the competitive days and nights of the Twins or not. After starting out the year getting beat up, he now has a 2.05 ERA in his last five starts. This is after going 4-14 with a 5.19 ERA last year with the Yankees.

What separates him from a typical Twins offseason pitching pickup is that he’s still pretty young at 28 years old. He’s a big dude and he throws a heavy ball on his good days. Right now he looks like a great acquisition.